Replies

1. 
   TomT226 | Dec 15, 2009 06:34am | #1

   I live in 1600 sq ft, and that's plenty. I grew up in about 1000 sq ft for four people, with one bathroom, and that was plenty. Two people don't need 6-8000 sq ft, a library, a media room, a sewing room, a gym, a sauna, and all that other BS. Nothing but ostentation, IMHO...

1. 
   Nuke | Dec 15, 2009 09:32am | #2

   Tom, you are presenting the opposite extreme for McMansions. I was, and probably will continue to be accused of, being in a McMansion at 2600 SqFt.

   I am not sure I know of any tract builders in Georgia that were mass producing even half of the 8000 example you commented on. The builders I see conducting tract construction were in the 2000-3500 arena for beginner homes to middle income household target customers.

1. 
   Luka | Dec 15, 2009 10:15am | #3

   I'm thinking 8000 sq ft IS a

   I'm thinking 8000 sq ft IS a mansion.

   No "Mc" about it.

   ;o)

2. 
   TomT226 | Dec 15, 2009 12:57pm | #4

   You gotta bunch of kids, 3500 sq foot is fine. Two people, you're an idiot. People need to address how much of a house they REALLY need instead of letting the market and TV dictate what they NEED. That's what's the matter with this country, everybody got a Champagne taste, but a buttermilk income...

1. 
   Nuke | Dec 16, 2009 06:18am | #8

   Tom, you lost it, man. You are suggesting that anything beyond need is a market dictated condition of want. Man has proven that need can be as small as a jail cell to survive. I doubt you and your family are living in the equivalent of occupants X jail cell sized accommodations.

   As such, your so called need is in excess of true need and this must be due to market-instilled want. Shame on you! :)

2. 
   aimless | Dec 23, 2009 11:59am | #17

   We just sold our 2600 sq foot home, and are having problems with squeezing into something smaller. We used every room every day in our house - and that, I think, is the difference between a McMansion and a big house. Our home had things we didn't NEED (a 9' pool table, for example, which requires a minimum of 221 sq ft to itself), but who is to dictate that because somebody decided we should all live in boxes of a certain size that we can't have that in our home. For me, 1 bathroom is never plenty for 4 people and 3 is too many. But I wouldn't tell somebody else that they could only have 2 bathrooms - maybe they need 3. I will also say that my annual energy bill was likely smaller than many 1600 sq ft homes - my house was pretty efficient and we didn't need to turn the heat on until several days of cold weather. Even after the heat was on my bills were about 1/2 or less than the area I'm moving to, and I'm coming from a colder clime.

2. 
   cussnu2 | Dec 15, 2009 01:52pm | #5

   I'm at 3700 sq ft 3 baths 5
   I'm at 3700 sq ft 3 baths 5 beds not counting the 2000 sq ft basement. Never once though of it as a McMansion but then I don't have any wasted space either. 8ft ceilings throughout. Story & 1/2 with four dormers.

   I think people should be looking at cubic ft versus sq ft. I have more sq ft than a lot of houses around here but less cubic ft because of all the wasted two story great rooms etc.

3. 
   CapnMac | Dec 15, 2009 03:37pm | #6

   http://forums.finehomebuilding.com/comment/2051116#comment-2051116

   Cubic feet would be an interesting metric, consider just how many cubic feet are actually used in a bedroom. Especially one with a raised ceiling. Ditto for some of those tract-builder bathrooms, acres of empty floor and 12' tall ceiling, all in marigold painted gypsum board.

   Now, the trick might be in educating the buyers, though.

   If you spent a lot of time in apartments, especially with room mates, you can develop a fixation, for lack of a better term, that you need to be able to get all of "your" stuff in a room. Which is slightly contrary to the "purpose" of rooms in a design sense.

   The tract-builder types are knocking plans out with no real purpose to the rooms, only a list of room names. Thus, they'll have a "family room" that will not hold a family; and a "living room" to cold and souless to even collect the mail; dining rooms in which no one eats.

   Now, even designing 'to purpose' can have its pratfalls, too. I've tried this myself, and I often find the plans getting to 18-1900 sf--which then strikes me, as my present 1400 is too large and too small at the same time.

   It's a dilemma, and one that defies simpler answers.

1. 
   ravz | Dec 15, 2009 04:11pm | #7

   Perhaps the TOH folks called it small because they have to constantly have a film crew / sound guy lighting guy etc while they are working.. maybe i am just misunderstanding the post tho.

1. 
   Nuke | Dec 16, 2009 06:22am | #9

   Nope, not the case. He called is small, because the home being situated in Lexington was constrained to no expansion of the original exterior walls and roof. That meant the original square footage had to remain the same, and as a result was considered to be small.

   Conversely, the project house in same style and original make-up was not being constrained and afford the three ~300 square foot additions. In other words, will not be small.

2. 
   Nuke | Dec 16, 2009 06:27am | #10

   While designs were probably affected by technology limitations over time, it isn't easy to take a 'style' and miniaturize it for smaller parameter measurement. For instance, it is not uncommon that a bunch of Yankee homes from the 1700's to have low ceilings while homes in redneck-land from the 1800's had high ceilings.

   Can you imagine a plantation style home with 7.5' ceilings, the minimum by code [in my area]? Heck, even a new home with 7.5' ceilings in any part of the country would probably be frowned upon by perspective buyers.

   But I digress. We all buy homes based in part, if not majorically by desire and not by penalized need. While tract builders will build to what they perceive the market wants, it is interesting that TOH is calling an old home small, and not in such a positive manner.

1. 
   TomT226 | Dec 16, 2009 06:39am | #11

   The 7-1/2-8' ceilings in the
   The 7-1/2-8' ceilings in the "south" were for temperature mitigation before A/C. A high ceiling and large windows, some floor level, french doors, porches, and sleeping porches, all took advangtage of the available breeze.

   These wouldn't work in northern latitudes because of the extremely cold winters would make for a really drafty home.

   When Fredrick Law Olmstead took a trip from his native NY into the south in the mid-1850's, the most common "plantation" home in Louisiana and Texas was a one room structure of about 500 sq ft, with a front and back door, no windows, of chinked log construction with a "mud-cat" hearth. The doors stayed open 24/7/365 except on the coldest days. The slaves slept on one side, the owners on the other.

   Doesn't sound too much like "Tara" does it... ;-)

4. 
   roger g | Dec 16, 2009 09:10am | #12

   Years ago it was explained to me: "we(humans) are like goldfish, we grow to the size of the container".

   So true.

   roger

1. 
   TomT226 | Dec 16, 2009 09:18am | #13

   LMAO. So true. That's why I
   LMAO. So true. That's why I stays outta Wal-Mart...

1. 
   Nuke | Dec 16, 2009 09:33am | #14

   The Diamond Walmart near me prices for their diamond customers. For instance, I was in there early Saturday for a $5 item and noticed a Sony Blu-ray player. Their price was $199.99, but the second most expensive store in town was Best Buy, which sold it for $149.99 regular price.

   Asking the sales person, we only will match another retailer in a sales advertisement. If it isn't in an ad, we will not match a competitor's regular pricing. What???

   So, I've been telling folks in Diamond Walmart to go down to Costco (one exit away) and get it for $129.99 and screw both DW and BB. :)

   DW is playing off of the 'more money than brains' rule.

5. 
   timr | Dec 18, 2009 10:49pm | #15

   In a recent TOH magazine article, Abram was talking about what he's learned over the past 30 year of working with TOH. In his last item he commented on the house he built for himself in the mid 90's. He said in retrospect, he wished we would have built a smaller home (around 2500 sqft) and more energy efficent.

1. 
   Nuke | Dec 19, 2009 07:48am | #16

   I'm going to make a statement
   I'm going to make a statement here based solely on guessing. :)

   More than 90% of the homes in existence today, and certainly better than that for those built in the last 10-15 years could have probably been built to be more than 50% more energy efficient.

   I'll go on to suggest that this wasn't a cost issue, but an industry of ever-growing large corporations hell-bent on the mass production philosophy and never embrace technology as to reinforce the cancerous practices that have led to a new generation of early delapidating home inventories with some of the same inefficient performances comparable to homes built prior to 1070.

   Sure, I am a negative-minded individual, but since when has anything proven me wrong when talking about the evils of man. :)

   I'm still trying to understand why we stick-build and use shredded fiberglass batts (or blown finely shredded). As a society, institution, and culture in questionable control, we will not change.